


Mark of Misgivings

by madmogs



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: (but only just), Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Derek Hale's Past Consent Issues with Kate Argent, M/M, Past Rape/Non-con, Pre-Canon, Self-Harm, no happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-14
Updated: 2019-10-14
Packaged: 2020-12-14 21:28:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21022535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madmogs/pseuds/madmogs
Summary: See, soulmates arebullshit.  No, seriously they are. Like, just under 99% of the population develops a soulmark in the first year of their life, which sounds like a lot, until you do the math and realize that there's like three million soulmarkless idiots just like you in the USA alone.  Which is great, but when you're in high school and statistically there's only gonna be one and a half of you in your year then ... well, your classmates are gonna just assume that you're like, a defective weirdo, and that's gonna suck. A lot.Halfway through Sophomore year and sixteen years too late, Stiles Stilinski, apparently, suddenly somehow acquires a soulmark.Derek Hale, on the other hand, has a perfectly functional soulmark, matching that of the person who worked very hard to destroy his entire life. The very last thing in the world he wants is another soulmark.





	Mark of Misgivings

**Author's Note:**

> Please note the tags. More specific warnings at the end.

Stiles ignores the itching at first. 

It's like, on the small of his back, so it takes a mirror and some squirming to see anyway, and the first cursory check shows a few faint red blotches, that he scratches and doesn't think anything more of. Only it gets itchier and itchier, and then it just -- stops. And suddenly Stiles has a sneaking suspicion of what that might be all about and ... oh no. Suddenly he's pretty sure he knows what that was all about, he has a lot of feelings about it and he can't put a name to even one of them.

See, soulmates are _bullshit_. No, seriously they are. Like, just under 99% of the population develops a soulmark in the first year of their life, which sounds like a lot, until you do the math and realize that there's like three million soulmarkless idiots just like you in the USA alone. Which is great, but when you're in high school and statistically there's only gonna be one and a half of you in your year then ... well, your classmates are gonna just assume that you're like, a defective weirdo, and that's gonna suck. A lot.

And it's not like having a soulmate is all roses either. Stiles has read the studies, including that super controversial Indian one comparing the results of soulmate matches with the work of professional matchmakers that researchers all over the world have been trying and failing to debunk ever since. (Thirteen year old Stiles was a _maven_ regarding research methodology. For some strange reason that didn't make him less weird; but it did reassure him that that study was about as legit as it was possible to get.) Then there's the 0.3% of people who are born with or acquire multiple marks, and the ... unknown percentage of people who find that their soulmatch is just, like, a terrible match for them in every way.

(And the laws, fuck. There are no stats around soulmate abuse because ... soulmates. Legally, you can get away with doing stuff to your soulmate that you would be arrested if you did to literally anyone else. His dad keeps a private record of those cases, because fuckers who do _that_ are probably not going to be content with just one vic in the long term. But, depressing. And awful.) 

Anyway, soulmates are bullshit. And halfway through Sophomore year and sixteen years too late, Stiles Stilinski, apparently, has suddenly somehow acquired one.

* * *

He skips the changing rooms after lacrosse and heads straight home instead. Somehow he manages to keep something resembling conversation up with Scott on the drive back, but ... well, he said some things, anyway. He has no idea what the things were, but Scott didn't seem to notice he was jittering right out of his skin. That suits him just fine. 

Home. Dad's out, so Stiles can head up to the bathroom and strip off and ... hyperventilate in front of the bathroom mirror without looking at his back at all, apparently. Yeah, that's totally gonna help. 

Man up, Stilinski, he tells himself. The inner voice sounds like Jackson, which kind of backfires because Stiles's instinctive reaction to Jackson using that tone on him is usually something along the lines of 'screw you, no.' And then he thinks, what the fuck am I gonna do if it matches Jackson's mark, and he can't not look. 

It's ... actually kinda pretty, in a messy kind of way. An intricate, abstract shape with some kind of rotational symmetry deal going on, full of spirals and swirls, and speckles that look almost like stars. Like some kinda fancy spirally firework. Huh. 

He reaches back and it feels a little warmer to the touch than the rest of his skin, the lines and stars very slightly raised. It thrums slightly when he touches it. It's very, very definitely not a suspicious rash that he can smear some cream on and ignore. It's also definitely not the same as Jackson Whittemore's, or anyone else's who he's seen wandering around the boys locker room, which is mostly a relief. 

(He lets himself think about Danny's gorgeous fractal pattern for a moment, wrapping around his right hip) 

(Uncomfortable, he peers back at his own pattern again and tries to imagine it on Lydia Martin's perfect, creamy skin. For some reason he just can't picture it. He envisaged something more minimal for Lydia. Something elegant but sparse. His is ... well, kind of a mess. which is probably fitting, really.)

And what even kind of person would be his soulmate anyway? 

He pulls the t-shirt back on, mind churning. This might be a good thing? he ... guesses? but he's a terrible liar, even to himself. It's going to be a disaster, obviously. His dad is going to be so delighted, and it's going to be a disaster.

Fuck it, he decides. He needs a distraction or he's going to crawl out of his own fucking skin. And dad won't be back for hours given the whole half-a-body-in-the-preserve thing he's out at.

Half a body in the woods, he decides. Should be just the distraction he needs.

* * *

Derek Hale knows exactly what the prickling on his right thigh is and ... no. Nonononono. 

He has to pull over three miles into Beacon County and sit there gripping the steering wheel like it can somehow anchor him. It can't be that. He can't do this again. He can't.

On his left hip, his _other_ soulmark gives a vengeful twinge. He'd tried to claw it off, after the fire. Night after night, when Laura was out restlessly patrolling the blocks around their run-down apartment that were definitely not their territory, he'd try to tear and tear away at the mark of his family's killer, careless of his own pain, careless of the flesh under the skin, of veins and sinews, of the chipped white bathroom tiles., the cheap blue towels and bath mat.

(Some marks are meant to stay, though.)

After _she_ started doing things he wasn't sure he wanted he'd thought about breaking it off, but ... but how do you leave your soulmate? 

In books it was always written as a betrayal, a weakness. As the ultimate proof of cowardice. (Probably in movies too, but actors' heartbeats never sounded right for the action on screen; he couldn't get into them.) He'd tried to leave, once when things were -- bad; she'd accused him of leading her on, trying to duck his responsibilities. He'd been fifteen, earnest enough to want to prove he was mature; young enough not to understand what that meant. Off-balance enough not to understand exactly why he felt like shit whenever they'd finished-- that. So he tried again, to be the soulmate she would want. And again, and again.

He wondered, always, what it was about him that made her his match. Is he, somehow, like her? Was she his punishment, for Paige?

The prickling of his right thigh drains away like water, and the sudden cessation of pain makes him flinch in the way that pain cannot. Another soulmate, as if the first one had not been a thousand times more than enough. As if he could possibly survive doing all of this again.

He just. He just really needs to see Laura. 

(He'll never see Laura again. He'll wonder if this was the second soulmate, finishing off what the first one started.)

(He'll try to cope, try to stay alive. He'll very carefully not look at his new mark.)

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for: graphic depiction of self-harm; references to the badness that was Kate Argent and underage Derek Hale.
> 
> In my head Danny's soulmark looks kind of like a [Julia set](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_set#/media/File:Julia_set,_plotted_with_Matplotlib.svg)


End file.
